Here's the Chargers release announcing Sunday's blackout, the first of an NFL telecast this season:

"Per the National Football League’s long-standing policy that requires all games not sold out 72 hours prior to kickoff to be blacked out in the local market, the game between the San Diego Chargers and the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday, Dec. 1 at 1:25 pm PT at Qualcomm Stadium will not be televised live in Southern California."

The italics are mine.

The Chargers seem to think it's important to note they didn't set the blackout policy. The NFL did.

But the Chargers hold several cards in the blackout game.

The Chargers set the ticket prices. And a Chargers home game, as we've noted a few times, will lighten your cash stash in a hurry. A survey found that a Chargers home game last year cost a family of four about $466, and that was more expensive than all but six of the other 31 teams.

The Chargers, coming off a 7-9 season in which half of their home games were blacked out, announced lower ticket prices for some seats this year, but also raised other ticket prices. They announced no lower prices for concessions (including the league's most expensive beer in 2012) or parking ($25).

Seating capacity is another area where the Chargers have influence. Tarping off seats for all home games as the Raiders and Jaguars have would reduce capacity and therefore the blackout threat. (Perhaps a sponsor's logo on the tarp would offset some of the revenues lost to capacity.) The NFL offers another blackout hedge: set 85 percent of a sellout as the trigger to lift the blackout for all home games.

Another solution available to the Chargers, one that probably would go down like vinegar, is to buy up enough tickets to nix a blackout. Some teams, including Miami, do it.

Were the Chargers to buy tickets, only they would know, it seems. But Dean Spanos has said he's opposed to it.

The Chargers say the blackout owed to about 5,000 unsold tickets. By not buying those tickets, the club saved a specific amount of money.

But there was a cost to not buying those tickets. That cost is impossible to calculate -- but it is a cost.

It's the cost of a large number of fans -- a much larger number than will actually attend the game -- not being able to watch the game live in Southern California. A segment of those fans are children. Children who are potential future customers.

I can't imagine the NFL is thrilled with the Chargers. The League, along with the Chargers, wants telecasts to reach the home market.

The timing for this blackout is awful. The Chargers (5-6) are coming off their most exciting game of the season, a road victory over the Chiefs (9-2). The playoff dream isn't dead. Mike McCoy, like most coaches, talks of finding a way to win games. The Chargers organization didn't find a way to sell enough tickets.